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When I think of Hawaii, I think of the usual clichés: tropical beaches, hula dancers, sunburned tourists with fanny packs, coup-d’états by fruit corporations (true story), and pit-roasted pork. I certainly don’t think of craft beer. However, I’ve never been to Hawaii, so I realize my cartoonish perception of the islands is almost completely influenced by clever marketing campaigns and ill-informed pop culture references (Brady Bunch Goes to Hawaii, anyone?). Truth is, Hawaii does have great beer (as evident by Maui’s CoCoNut Porter & Kona’s Pipeline Porter), but all of the exotic flavors of the islands are under-represented in craft beer. Thankfully, talented homebrewer and Hawaii lover, Ken Schmidt, is helping to change that.

Remember when Ken won our March Madness Competition at our AHA Rally with his Aloha Plenty Porter? Well, we were stoked to brew with Ken and replicate his decadent creation on a larger scale, and Greg got the bright idea to invite Garrett Marerro from Maui Brewing Co. to join in on the collaboration and bring his CoCoNut Porter brewing expertise to the table. Garrett agreed to come on board, and thus the beer officially became Ken Schmidt/Maui/Stone Kona Coffee, Macadamia, Coconut Porter.

Ken Schmidt/Maui/Stone Kona Coffee, Macadamia, Coconut Porter

As Mitch started converting the recipe, he was blown away by the ingredients required. Not only were they going to be ridiculously expensive, but he had no idea where he was going to get 1,000 lbs. of coconut, 300 lbs. of macadamia nuts, and 200 lbs. of 100% Kona Coffee. The easy answer would have been to use cheap extracts and adjuncts, but as you know—we don’t take shortcuts. Fortunately, Garrett hooked us up with the same distributor that his company uses for ingredients, and gave us some pointers on how to toast the coconut and make sure the right amount of flavor is imparted into the beer.

Our collaborations are usually between three brewers, but this time there was a fourth player that deserves some credit. Our Bistro team put in some long hard hours toasting 1,000 lbs. of coconut in our relatively tiny oven in the Bistro Kitchen, a process that spanned four eight-hour shifts. When Garrett heard of the Bistro staff’s contribution, he cringed and said “I hope someone’s buying those guys beers!”

After spending several weeks accruing all the rare ingredients, it finally came time to brew the beer on June 29th. However, preparing all the ingredients took way longer than expected, and we even came up short on steeping bags (think giant tea bags). In the true spirit of collaboration, Garrett enlisted the aid of another local brewery to resolve our steeping bag shortage: “I said ‘Hey call Green Flash,’ and sure enough they had a bunch they could lend to us, so we went and picked ‘em up. We wouldn’t have been able to get the coconut and the coffee and everything in there if we hadn’t gotten those bags, so the collaboration reaches really far beyond just us.”

Ken Schmidt and Garrett Marrero monitoring the brew

The brewers decided to load all 22 steeping bags into the whirlpool, which resulted in a near-comical, yet delicious display of flailing steeping bags full of ingredients tethered to the manway, flopping around in a tangled mess as they bestowed their delectable flavors upon the beer.

Despite a few minor hiccups (and a hell of a time removing the incredibly heavy saturated steeping bags), the brew went through the brewhouse spectacularly and is now fermenting. So what happens next? According to Mitch, the beer will go through a dry-hopping process of sorts, in which more Kona Coffee, macadamia nuts, and toasted coconut will be added to the beer post-fermentation.

Garrett, Ken and crew hauling the steeping bags full of rich ingredients up to the whirlpool

Ken Schmidt/Maui/Stone Kona Coffee, Macadamia, Coconut Porter is unlike anything we’ve ever brewed here at Stone, and Ken, Garrett, and Mitch all had an awesome time brewing it. The day after brewing, Ken seemed to have an excitement hangover: “It’s one of those rare days in a person’s life that’s really extra special, and when you’re coming down you can’t quite take it all in quick enough.”

Expect to see Ken Schmidt/Maui/Stone Kona Coffee, Macadamia, Coconut Porter on shelves in late August or early September.

Stone and homebrewers go way back. We’ve been hosting the monthly meetings of the local homebrew club, The Society of Barley Engineers, since 1996—back before we even had any tanks in our original building in San Marcos. To this day they still meet the first Wednesday of every month upstairs in the Bistro (the Barley Literates also meet in our Bistro). We’ve also offered up many of our recipes for homebrewers to attempt their own versions of our beers, including our Vertical Epic Challenge, which challenges homebrewers to brew clones of our various Stone Vertical Epic Ales. Steve Wagner, our Co-founder and Brewmaster, even got his start as a homebrewer:

Needless to say, we understand the importance of the homebrewing community. That’s why we’ve hosted an American Homebrewers Association Membership Rally every year since we opened the Bistro. Aside from bolstering the ranks of the AHA, these rallies provide a casual forum for homebrewers to share each other’s creations, chat with professional brewers, and bond with other homebrewers. Our rallies keep getting bigger and better every year.

Cheers!

When it came time to plan this year’s AHA Membership Rally, we decided to up the ante on our homebrewing competition. This time the winning brew would be brewed on our system to be served here at Stone. With the strength of our local homebrew scene, we knew the response would be phenomenal—and it was. Members of So. Cal. homebrew clubs delivered twenty-three incredibly tasty brews, along with four outstanding brews submitted by individual homebrewers.

List of Official Entries

We were quite pleased by the strong showing of enthusiastic homebrewers. According to AHA Director, Gary Glass, this was the biggest AHA Rally EVER in terms of RSVP’s and new members. That’s a stat to be proud of, and with the help of local homebrewers we’ll top that next year.

Homebrewers came from near and far to take part in the blind tasting and cast their vote for their favorite. Many drove several hours from neighboring counties to participate, but long time Stone fans Roberto and Jade Saldivar had them beat. They trekked all the way from Dublin, CA, (near San Francisco), where they are part of a homebrew club called Mad Zymurgists. Roberto and Jade displayed true dedication by making the long trip down to one of their “favorite places in the world” just to attend the rally. Noticing my age, they jokingly added “We’ve been Stone fans since way before you were here.”

As the polls closed, four beers emerged as fan favorites. Many attendees were impressed by Eric Holden’s The Event Horizon, an innovative Vanilla and Peppercorn Imperial Russian Stout, as well as Jeremy Jerome’s Admiral Nelson—a tasty Rye IPA. Attendees also delighted in Brad Sayles’s Kalifornien Kolsch, a refreshing take on a Kolsch beer, and Ken Schmidt’s fantastic Aloha Plenty Porter with Kona Coffee, toasted coconut and macadamia nuts. After tallying all the votes, it turned out these were the top four beers.

All four beers were expertly crafted, but only one could prevail. After several minutes of tense deliberation, Ken Schmidt’s Aloha Plenty surfaced as the clear winner. Mitch Steele announced the four finalists, and then presented Ken Schmidt as the winner. Ken was psyched to claim the grand prize. “I had been thinking about the recipe for six years, said Ken, “but it was Garrett’s (Garrett Marrero of Maui Brewing Co.) Coconut Porter that inspired me to go ahead with it. I wanted to brew something that infuses all of the elements of the islands and captures their essence.”

Winner Ken Schmidt (right) celebrating with Stone CEO Greg Koch

Mitch Steele was impressed with Ken’s Aloha Plenty, calling it “a phenomenal beer.” He’s looking forward to brewing it with Ken (and possibly Garret) here at Stone. “We’ll have to figure out how to toast a lot of coconut and get our hands on a lot of macadamia nuts,” he said, “but I think it’s going to be great.”

As promised, Ken will have the chance to brew his Aloha Plenty on our system to be served here, so watch out for it on tap in the Bistro. Also, because the brew had previously won a Beer Judge Certificate Program sanctioned homebrew competition, we’re submitting it to compete in the Pro-Am Competition at the GABF. To top it off, Greg Koch hinted at a possible three-way collaboration with Ken, Garrett Marrero from Maui Brewing Co. and Mitch Steele. Ken was all smiles, admitting that “it will be so cool to brew on Stone’s system.”

We were blown away by the quality of all the submissions. Our local homebrewers are arguably some of the best in the nation, and they once again proved that they’re capable of producing amazing beers. We can’t wait for next year’s AHA Rally, but in the meantime, head over to the AHA website to become a member and join some of the most prestigious homebrewers in the nation. Cheers to Ken for a job well done, and congrats to the runners-up. All the beers were phenomenal, but if you didn’t get a chance to taste Ken’s Aloha Plenty at the rally, you missed out. You don’t want to miss it again, so stay tuned for the upcoming collaboration, and get ready to taste “the essence of the islands.”